The germs from the COVID-19 coronavirus can live for up to three days on plastic and stainless steel, according to virologists in the US.
The laboratory team at the National Institute of Health in Hamilton, Montana say that since the bacteria clung to these materials for days, it suggests that hospital equipment could be at risk.
To find their results, the researchers sprayed the virus on common materials found in homes and hospitals to see how long it remained infectious.
Other materials they tested the virus on were copper and cardboard, where it lasted for four hours and one day respectively.
It was also blown around inside an air chamber where the germs lived for about three hours.
The MIT Technology Review says although it will take detailed epidemiological studies to find out exactly how the virus spreads, the new findings show that it can cling to common objects including phone cases and postal packages.
But there's so far no proof that the virus is spread via inanimate objects.
"We don't know if you can pick up COVID-19 from contaminated surfaces or inanimate objects at this point. That's the bottom line," University of Washington microbiologist Marilyn Roberts told the MIT Technology Review.
The disease is spread through droplets when infected people cough or sneeze. When other people pick these droplets up, that's when they can get the virus.
"Virus stability in air and on surfaces may directly affect virus transmission, as virus particles need to remain viable long enough after being expelled from the host to be taken up by a novel host," the virology study says.
The study also says the virus spreading through the air is a likely explainer for "super spreader" events, where large groups of people can become ill due to one infected person.
But super-spreaders are rare because COVID-19 is estimated to only infect between two and four people for every infected person, according to a study in the Journal of Travel Medicine.
The virologists say they're now studying how long the disease lasts in spit, snot and faecal matter.
